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Facing Danger
Facing Danger is the fourth installment of the Dangerverse ''series by Anne B. Walsh, preceded by and followed by . Started in 2006 and finished in 2011, Facing Danger'' is 444,645 words long, and was the first one to have taken more than a year to finish (mostly because real life is harder than college). Facing Danger consists of 60 chapters, depicting Harry's struggle with Umbridge and the Death Eaters while doing what he can for the Order of the Phoenix. Summaries Synopsis !Spoiler Warning! Fifth Year Sirius returns to pureblood society and meets sisters Elladora and Corona Gamp, the latter of whom chafes at the restrictions placed on her. Luna's restored Seeing power overwhelms her at times, giving her prophetic visions, including one which frightens her badly. Harry deals with the Dursleys, then meets up with Remus, who tells him about a possible plan to stop Voldemort from invading his mind; if Harry contracts a blood-bond with another adult wizard, it will block Voldemort's bond. Dumbledore has urged this bond be with Remus himself, and Harry likes the idea, though not the consequence that he, as Danger, would contract lupus from it. Remus brings along Draco, in his fox Animagus form, to keep Harry company. When Draco returns to the Den, Luna reluctantly tells him about her vision; she has seen his gravestone, dated June 5, 1997, and herself agreeing to go away with Lucius Malfoy. Draco is shaken but resolves not to let this knowledge destroy his life. Hermione becomes the Pride's liaison to the Order, then goes to visit Harry in cat form and tells him about Hagrid and Madame Maxime going to look for the giants and about Charlie and his team transporting Norbert the Norwegian Ridgeback to another dragon preserve. Sirius feels his pendants activate for Hagrid and decides to leave the purebloods, who aren't listening to him anyway. Corona asks if she can go with him, to fight against Voldemort; Elladora tries to interpret this badly. Ron realizes that Norbert might be able to help Hagrid and sends Tonks to give Charlie the idea, which works. Sirius helps retrieve Harry from Privet Drive, then proposes magical marriage to Aletha, so the purebloods will have no further opportunities to scorn her. Corona befriends Brian Li, a young werewolf member of the Order of the Phoenix, and their pasts later coincide. Dobby and Winky announce their plans to marry, which, with Charlie and Tonks' planned ceremony, makes three weddings for the Order. The Founders help the Pack realize that Remus and Harry can link their blood-bond to an amulet, so that the ill effects on Harry will last only as long as he wears the amulet. The bond also permits Remus to unbind Harry’s fire magic. Luna Sees something she dislikes about Slytherin's locket, and Dumbledore comes to retrieve it, telling Harry the full prophecy, which Harry passes along, somewhat edited, to the Pride. Mrs. Longbottom agrees to teach Defense for the year, blocking Dolores Umbridge from the post, though Umbridge is still Hogwarts Inquisitor. Sirius and Aletha marry magically, vowing that should they ever use magic against one another, they wish to lose their own magic. Meghan worries because her friend Graham Pritchard has not returned to school (it is later verified that he is being held as a hostage to force his father into Death Eater activities). Harry openly cheeks Umbridge, who gives him detention; when Harry refuses to write lines with Umbridge's Contract Quill, Umbridge takes him to Dumbledore's office and announces that she is expelling him. Through an apparently rambling speech, Dumbledore is able to direct Harry to the Hogwarts Den entrance by his own fireplace, which Harry uses, but is then overcome by a flare-up of his lupus. The rest of the Pride finds him in the Den and makes him comfortable. By accident, Harry discovers a talent for astral travel (out-of-body work), and realizes he can attend classes in spirit form while technically expelled. He also goes "walking" out to Hogsmeade and discovers the place where Graham is being held, and Dumbledore informs him that the Pride may be called upon to rescue Graham. With Ginny's help, Harry conceives of the DA, and Neville thinks to ask the house elves where they can meet. A small number of Slytherins show up to the first meeting in the Room of Requirement and are looked at askance, but Harry welcomes them, as long as they're willing to fight. Cho Chang shows some interest in Harry, and Sirius stops Kreacher from reporting the DA to Umbridge. Bartemius Crouch attempts to befriend Aletha and Danger with mixed results. Ginny helps the boys model the house where Graham is being kept, to better plan their rescue; Hermione soothes Ron's anger about not being allowed to be an active part of the rescue by showing him how he can be "mission control". Maya Pritchard, Graham's older Gryffindor cousin, uses his fate to help her decide she will not acquiesce to her own parents' demands but instead will pursue her interest in Lee Jordan. Harry and Cho have their first "date", which goes well until Harry reveals the Pack and Pride are bonded with blood magic, which Cho interprets as Dark. Hermione points out to Harry that Cho was only interested in him, never taking the time to get to know the rest of his family or friends. Meghan completes her first Animagus transformation, and Draco meets Ravenclaw Amanda Smythe while admiring a prank in which Professor Umbridge is stuck, mooing, on the Astronomy Tower. The Pride, in Animagus form, invade the Death Eater hideout where Graham is and rescue him, though Neville is slightly injured. Sangre the basilisk tells Harry about the entrance to the Hogwarts Den which is outdoors near the lake. Aletha announces that she is pregnant, which causes much rejoicing. Maya comforts Graham, who is currently sharing Harry's hiding place in the Hogwarts Den. Harry realizes that his interest in Ginny would work better than his one in Cho and "breaks" Ron when his friend walks in on them kissing. Ginny and Hermione have a ritual battle to pass the alpha female position of the Pride, and Harry wishes he could know what his parents think of him. Harry and Ginny, roaming the forest in Animagus form, come across Theodore Nott, frightened of being forced into DE activities or imprisoned as Graham was; they offer him help, which he accepts, his price being to guard Graham when the younger boy returns to the Slytherin dorms. Draco writes an encouraging version of "Weasley is Our King" to help deal with Ron's Quidditch jitters, and Lavender Brown moves in, upsetting Hermione, though Harry can tell her that it's unlikely to last. A number of high-ranked Death Eaters, including Bellatrix Lestrange and Lucius Malfoy, escape from Azkaban, leading Draco to further his acquaintance with Amanda. Harry and Ginny share their pendants while kissing, then accidentally get the wrong ones when they remove them as Umbridge attacks the Room of Requirement. Harry thanks the DA for standing strong and activates a hidden door to the Hogwarts Den, through which the DA escapes, though Harry himself is caught. Umbridge lays two spells on Harry, one which multiplies his sensory inputs by a hundred, the other which saps his emotional energy, then transports him to the Department of Mysteries, intending to have him declared insane. Winky overcomes her fears and tells Mrs. Weasley that the Barty Crouch they know is in fact Barty Crouch, Jr., disguised as his father. Harry, no longer bonded with Remus because Ginny has his pendants, sees Voldemort's desire for the prophecy; when that dream fades, Harry is able to use his Animagus form and his astral traveling to destroy Umbridge's emotion-manipulating spell and to discover where he is. Fawkes the phoenix finds him and brings him his own pendants, as well as removing the other spell; Harry sends back Ginny's pendants, and the Pack-parents head for the Ministry to retrieve their cub. Harry defends Mr. Weasley from Crouch's attack, then goes to take the prophecy, dodging Death Eaters. Danger uses her links to some of the Death Eaters and her wild magic to stop them from killing anyone who is fighting against them. Sirius and Aletha trail Harry to the room with the archway, known as the Gateway to Hades, where Crouch finds them and is about to knock Sirius through the arch. Aletha kills Crouch, though not in time to stop his spell, and Harry's accidental magic shields Sirius, but the spell is reflected and strikes Aletha, killing her unborn child, Marcus. Harry, thrown out of his body by the spell backlash, gets to see his parents, who come to take Marcus and tell him that they are indeed proud of him. Remus saves Lucius Malfoy's life and uses that to lay a geas on him that he will not kill the Pride. Harry agrees to have his memories of his parents taken from him in order to fool Voldemort, who comes to the Ministry to retrieve the prophecy, killing Umbridge in the process; unbeknownst to him, Harry has already destroyed the prophecy and placed fire within the glass ball, which burns Voldemort's hand. Cornelius Fudge, shocked into truthfulness by Voldemort's appearance, reveals that Umbridge killed Andromeda Tonks two years ago, to stop the truth about the poisoning of the current Minister of Magic from becoming public. Luna and Amanda agree to have a contest over Draco (revealing that Amanda is more than she appears), Rufus Scrimgeour becomes Minister of Magic, and the Second War has officially begun. Arc Six Note: Some of this takes place during the school year, but is considered part of Arc Six by Anne. The Pack and Pride grieve for baby Marcus, and are given enchanted tokens of mourning by Theodore Nott and Dudley Dursley. Hagrid returns home, relates leaving Norberta the Norwegian Ridgeback with his "little" brother Grawp, and accepts an invitation to spend Christmas with the Pack. Sirius breaks up a fight between Dobby and Kreacher, then agrees with Aletha that they can return to the Marauders' Den for Christmas. Dumbledore hires Hestia Jones, Order member and school friend of the Pack-parents, to take over the History of Magic post from Professor Binns; Luna sees something unusual about her but does not mention it. Harry and the DA send Cho Chang, who betrayed them to Umbridge, a necklace of thirty silver coins, charmed to be unremovable until she proves she cares about other people more than herself. Brian Li, badly injured, makes it to the Marauders' Den with news that simultaneous werewolf attacks on a number of pureblood witches are planned for the full moon just after New Year's; Corona takes over caring for him. On the night of the full moon, the enchantments on Dursley's and Nott's tokens, kept at the Den, work together to make the girls want to leave the house. Death Eaters, including Lucius Malfoy and Fenrir Greyback, are waiting for them outside. Malfoy uses a spell which is not openly hostile and therefore will pass the Den's wards to blank out Hermione's emotional reactions, meaning her pendants will not turn hot; recognizing him as her blood father and oath-sworn not to kill her (so that the pendants will not turn cold either), she leaves the wards at his command and calls the other girls into the open where the same emotion-blanking spell can be used on them. Hagrid goes outside to check on the girls and follows their tracks past the wards, where the Death Eaters kill him. Harry and the male Warriors of the Pride, alerted by Hagrid's death, join their magic to search for the girls. Ron is the first to locate Hermione, and his anger at the emotionless feel of her mind and her memories of a Death Eater sexually assaulting her breaks the spell over her. She "awakens" to realize she is locked in a cage with Ginny, Luna, and Meghan, and a just-changed Greyback; when she ends the spell on the other girls, Luna and Meghan are able to change forms in time, but Ginny is incapacitated with a headache, and Greyback bites her. Hermione cuts Greyback with her silver dagger, and he dies messily, disintegrating into a pile of ashes. Meghan discovers that lycanthropy is actually a combination of a curse and a disease, and is able to transfer the curse from Ginny to Hermione (as Ginny is needed to help Harry continue the "lion's line") and stop the disease from taking hold. Cho helps Charlie and Tonks save another girl by first warning them of an attack from behind and then throttling the attacking werewolf with her now-removed necklace. Maya Pritchard allows herself to be bitten to save Selena Moon and her unborn child. Lee Jordan goes to the hospital to see her, and his unflinching love, along with that of Maya's cousins Graham and Bernadette and their parents, Par and Voni, alters the course of the establishment of the werewolf curse on her. Maya's parents admit that they allowed her to be attacked in exchange for fertility potions which will allow them to replace her; they are arrested for procuring Dark magic to be used on a minor, and Par and Voni take Maya in and agree to join the Order. Remus, in his werewolf form, and Danger, as the wolf, comfort Hermione; Aletha tells them that by showing her love, they have lessened the effect the werewolf curse will have on her soul, as Remus's parents did for him when he was bitten as a child. However, Hermione finds herself unable to tolerate the near presence of human males for several days, until Ron, angry at being kept in the dark, flies up to her room in Animagus form. They admit their mutual attraction to one another, and Hermione begins building her trust in people back up with that as a base. Elsewhere in the house, Harry and Ginny confront the reason Hermione took on the werewolf curse; Harry steels up his courage and asks Ginny to marry him, and Ginny agrees, though Mrs. Weasley demands that they not carry out the marriage until Ginny is sixteen. On the return to school, Hestia Jones' first History of Magic lessons involve stories, and Ron officially breaks up with Lavender Brown. The DA becomes an official club with Professor Longbottom as its sponsor. Harry divides the DA into artillery (under Neville's command, using magically-altered water guns known as potion pieces), skirmishers (diversionary fighters, meant to draw enemies into ambushes), Flying Squad (must be excellent fighters and look old enough to Apparate), and medics (generally the youngest members of the DA). The latter two divisions partner with house-elves, thus skirting the anti-Apparition wards. Dumbledore gives the Pride a new assignment: a long-standing spell, originally cast from Hogwarts, allows blood status to be magically determined. As this will be very useful to Voldemort, they should break it if they can, and Dumbledore believes that a year of good fellowship among a group of students of all Houses may do so. To help them with the fellowship, the Pride agrees to Dumbledore's suggestion that they build a Sanctuary where Muggle relatives of wizards can come to hide from the war. Draco suggests that they begin and end the year on May Day, and that Harry and Ginny marry to end the year; when asked why, he reveals Luna's vision to the Pride, and Hermione overcomes her lingering distrust of men to comfort him. Harry, Ginny, Draco, and Ron go searching for a location for Sanctuary; the Bloody Baron directs them to the cave where the first-years' boats are harbored, and they find a secret passage. Draco is momentarily taken over by an apparently benign presence which leads them to a small cave used as a tomb for the "serpent's daughter"; the revenant (similar to a ghost, but with a mission) speaking through Draco seems to have known her. Nearby they discover an enormous cave with which will serve well as a Sanctuary, and decide to wall off the tomb, giving its occupant privacy. At the opening ceremony for the year (the "yearmates" are drawn from the DA and span all four Houses), the ceiling of Sanctuary is enchanted to resemble that of the Great Hall, directly above it, and Lee Jordan officially founds a second Pride, to help Maya keep from feeling abandoned. Harry and his siblings take their O.W.L.s; Hestia Jones gives a lecture about Merlin, including the fact that he was Godric Gryffindor's stepson; and the DA passes their unofficial final exam, the invasion of Hogwarts by fifteen Aurors dressed as Death Eaters, with flying colors. George Weasley reveals the existence of magic to his Muggle girlfriend, Crystal Huley, aided by the Pride; Mrs. Weasley catches them and grounds them, backed up by the Pack-parents to the point where the Pack's cubs remain grounded even when the Weasleys, Luna, and Neville are allowed out again. Bernie Pritchard, at Headquarters with her family, befriends Dobby and Winky's twin elflets Echo and Cissus, and the three of them discover Kreacher's secret. Sirius reacts badly to discovering Regulus died a hero. Sirius opens the entrance to Diagon Alley for a Muggleborn witch, Annette Benson, and her teacher, Miss Evanie Meade; Annette is investigating Weasley's Wizarding Wheezes, where Percy and Penelope Clearwater are visiting the twins, when Death Eaters attack Diagon Alley. Annette, Penelope, and Frank Longbottom are killed; Remus and Fred Weasley are badly injured; and Percy, Evanie, and Sirius and Aletha are taken prisoner, along with Terry Boot's grandmother and Amanda Smythe's mother, both Muggles. At home with his siblings, Harry is pulled out of his body by Voldemort when his blood-bond with Remus fails. Working together, Hermione, Draco, and Meghan are able to put both Harry and Voldemort to sleep, then defeat Voldemort in their dream-world and wake Harry so that they can get to the Hogwarts Den via Harry's emergency Portkey. Danger places her bond with Remus in abeyance to search for Sirius and Aletha, while Harry reluctantly agrees that he must return to the Dursleys' until Remus recovers and can continue shielding Harry's mind; Draco agrees to go with him in fox-form so that he will not be alone. Peter Pettigrew, promised a reward for luring Sirius and Aletha out of hiding so that they could be captured, is struck by Evanie's appearance and asks for her; instead of trying to fight him, she begins to "corrupt" him by making his life more pleasant, and he responds in kind, beginning without realizing it to regain his humanity. Voldemort forces Sirius to wipe Aletha's memories, violating his magical marriage vow never to use magic against her and destroying his own magic. Aletha, now calling herself Mare, takes up basic household chores in the Death Eater hideout, including caring for Sirius, trapped in his dog form. Percy Weasley, left with the two Muggle women by Death Eaters who did not recognize him, learns from them to channel his anger and grief, which stands him in good stead when the rescue mission of George, Crystal (driving the Weasleys' car), Ginny, and Ron arrives. Ron has disguised himself as Percy and been captured, and the real Percy is only a few seconds too late to stop Dolohov from blinding his brother with magic so Dark that Meghan cannot use her Healing power on it. Ron shuts down when he learns what has happened to him; Percy, helped by his new knowledge and by a book given to him by Crystal, begins to plan his own part in the war. A few days later, Hermione is overwhelmed by everything that has gone wrong in her life lately and begins to cry. Mrs. Weasley removes the soundproofing charms on Ron's room, and Ron is pulled out of his self-pity by his need to help Hermione. They discover that Hermione's cat form can ride on Ron's shoulders and use his pendant chain to share her sight. The Pritchard children and the elflets help Meghan handle her fear for her parents, and Meghan helps Neville deal with his own grief for his father. Aletha/Mare, unaware that she shouldn't be able to, discovers her Healing gift, identifying her to Sirius as the Heir of Ravenclaw. In a dream, Mare feels drawn to Danger and the Den, but rejects them as "someone else's life"; she learns what the pendant chains do and befriends Sirius through their medium, but misidentifies Danger, now lurking outside the DE hideout in wolf form, as Sirius's missing wife. Sirius begins to tell Evanie stories about Peter, neither hiding or overstating his crimes. Dudley Dursley admits to Harry and Draco, currently locked into a bedroom at his parents' home, that he killed his Aunt Marge and has further plans; these are later revealed to include killing his own parents to "purify" his blood and destroy the blood wards on the Dursleys' home, but Sirius, defending himself, kills Dudley before these plans can come to fruition (though Vernon and Petunia still die at Death Eater hands). Mare beats the three Death Eaters who came with Dudley, then saves Sirius' life and turns him human; Sirius carries her to her "nest", where they collapse. Evanie, worried for her friends, slips out of Peter's room with the help of the house-elves she has befriended and finds Danger, bringing her into the manor. Danger gives Evanie a pair of wedding rings made from her pendant chain, which will help warn Peter if Evanie needs help; Evanie is later able to convince Peter to marry her, with house-elves as their witnesses. Mare puts together the pieces and concludes that she must be Aletha, and that her memories are stored in one of her pendants' blue jewels. She is correct in this belief, and in her assumption that her forgiveness of Sirius will restore his magic and allow them to escape; however, her memories return only partially, as though they belonged to someone else. Percy reveals that he is founding a new group to help in the fighting of the war, the Red Shepherds, designed both to draw Death Eater attention and to help take Muggles to safety at the DA's Sanctuary. Theodore Nott frees his family's house-elf and asks for asylum from the light side of the war, ending up as a houseguest of the Moon family. After a battle with giants in the middle of London, Mare decides to stay and learn to be Aletha, repairing Sirius's family tapestry and adding her own name to make her decision known, though she will be taking the Potions position at Hogwarts in the coming year to get necessary distance. Hermione agrees to meet Viktor Krum at the Den to receive some books from him which will help with the spell-breaking year, only to discover that he was the Death Eater who assaulted her in January. Ron, his sight restored by a heat-seeing spell Aletha has altered for him, arrives just in time to stop Hermione from killing Krum. Cissus the elflet asks Aletha to slow his maturation (usually house-elves become adult in eighteen months, rather than eighteen years for humans) so that he can stay close to Bernie's age for longer. Selena shows off her new son, Zachary Cedric Davies, and Harry receives some good advice from Danger: "When you have enough for tonight, you have all you'll ever need." Chapters # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # External links * * Category:Stories: Main Dangerverse